Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Ants

This rain.

Every time I turn around I see Hannibal crossing the frickin Alps in microminiature. Dense crooked columns of ants skirting the throw rug and scaling the kitchen chair.

I have discovered that Fantastik acts as a potent ant neurotoxin - I hope it doesn't have the same cumulative effect on me and Mr. Three, who has been a real help due to his closer proximity to the floor. "Mom! Mom! Over here! More ants!" Thanks, son.

I have removed everything possibly foodlike to the refrigerator. I have cleaned everything cleanable - even places that don't usually (ever) get attention have been spritzed with Fantastik and wiped when I find ants on them. Undersides of chairs, the like.

So they're not coming in looking for eats. They want my house.

Their homes have been flooded and they're looking to colonize. And yeah that's a word we use with ants, ants live in a colony, but I hadn't really thought about it. Now, with these little fuckers moving in, their militaristic mindless relentlessness, their willingness to keep coming even in places I've zapped repeatedly...

Well my mind just leaps to - ok I read a lot of science fiction in my formative years and sometimes it comes back to haunt me, usually when I have to think about economics, or if I'm face to face with the insect world. So as I squirt these little automata with my magic poison, I see android armies crumpling in their tracks. When I see them back again I envision wave after wave of terraformers fleeing their ruined planet.